One Of Bar Owners Who Accused Police Of Acting Like KKK Arrested For Shooting Unarmed Black Man

After video surfaced last winter at a bar in downtown Troy, New York, in which the owners believed one of their patrons had been the subject of excessive force by local officers, racial tensions began rising in the community.

A brawl had broken out at the establishment, and cell phone video of police officers detaining a patron who was African-American became national news. The FBI even got involved, eventually declining to investigate the incident due to a lack of evidence that any force had indeed been excessive.

When that didn’t go to their liking, Barry and Joseph Glick, a father and son team and owners of the bar Kokopellis, set out to destroy the reputation of the police force, accusing them of harassing customers and even comparing them to the Klu Klux Klan during the Civil Rights movement.

Many found (a local pastor’s) interpretation of the Kokopellis brawl premature. But he hasn’t been the only critic of the police. Kokopellis owner Barry Glick actually compared the department to the Ku Klux Klan — a comment Tedesco said gave him “a profound sense of repulsion.” Tedesco then alleged that Kokopellis employs felons and provides alcohol to the underaged.

Kokopellis closed officially on New Year’s Eve, but the owners held a private party on January 11th.

Police are investigating a shooting that happened at what appeared to be a private party at the now-closed Kokopellis bar and nightclub early Sunday.

Troy police said they were contacted by a person who had been at the bar on Fourth Street who said there was a person who was shot and had been taken by someone else to a Troy hospital. Upon further investigation, it was learned that there was a private gathering at the bar, which officially closed on New Year’s Eve, and that a person was shot. The victim suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Ironically, it was one of those same owners, Joseph Glick, who used excessive force in his own bar this time.

One of the owners of a Troy club that was the scene of a January shooting has been arrested. Troy Police say Joseph Glick, Jr., 37, has been charged with first degree assault following the January 11th shooting inside Kokopelli’s on 4th Street. The incident happened during a private party. When officers arrived, they spoke to several people who witnessed the shooting, but say Glick was uncooperative. After his arrest, a judge set bail at $20,000.

And his victim? According to local blogger Jim Franco, when the incident first happened, multiple witnesses claimed it was an unarmed black man.

Joe Glick, who owns Kokoeplli’s with his father Barry, was questioned last night by police but sources say he quickly consulted an attorney and was released Sunday morning.

By mid-week, Glick will likely be formally charged with aggravated assault or similar crimes in the shooting of an unarmed black man Sunday morning, according to sources. The victim, who was treated and released from a local hospital, has not been cooperative. However, sources say there are at least two witnesses.

In a Facebook post announcing the bar’s closure, Joe and Barry Glick again accused the police of brutality and said they were the cause of having to shutter the business.

They wrote:

Kokopellis is closing as a result of an incident that occurred in January of 2014 in which the Troy Police department brutally… beat a patron for no reason, which caused some up roar from the community.

Now, ironically, one of those same people has been arrested for shooting a patron for no reason.

About the AuthorRusty Weiss

Rusty Weiss is a freelance journalist focusing on the conservative movement and its political agenda. He has been writing conservatively charged articles for several years in the upstate New York area, and his writings have appeared in the Daily Caller, American Thinker, FoxNews.com, Big Government, the Times Union, and the Troy Record. He is also Editor of one of the top conservative blogs of 2012, the Mental Recession.

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